


having the hots, and what to do with them

by dilfhakoda



Series: the beast with two backs [1]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Adolescent Sexuality, Bisexual Character, Bisexual Male Character, Cisnormative Sex Talks, Eventual Katara/Zuko (Avatar), Exploration, F/M, Gen, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Implied/Referenced Underage Sex, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, No Smut, Self-Discovery, Sex Talk, Zuko (Avatar)-centric, Zuko is an Awkward Turtleduck, jsyk, this is abt zuko so it wont spend much time on any one relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-01
Updated: 2020-07-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:28:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,494
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25009231
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dilfhakoda/pseuds/dilfhakoda
Summary: Sex happens. It's on the mind, even during times of war. Especially during times of war, some might say.Or: Zuko's relationship with sex.
Relationships: Jet/Zuko (Avatar), Jin/Zuko (Avatar), Katara/Zuko (Avatar), Mai/Zuko (Avatar), Sokka & Zuko (Avatar), Suki & Zuko (Avatar)
Series: the beast with two backs [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2077662
Comments: 24
Kudos: 243





	having the hots, and what to do with them

**Author's Note:**

> This is un beta'd so forgive me for any mistakes :) Also, i might come back and add some more scenes later, because some of it seems a bit out of place at times. other than that, enjoy!
> 
> CW: Non-explicit sexual assault in the first segment.

He hasn’t seen this room before. It is tucked away, far inside the palace, appropriately clandestine. Zuko wonders if his father had come here before, for this specific purpose, to commit this specific act—if he _still did_. 

Sweat is quickly gathering on his body, burning hot and slimy. He knows it must be disgusting to touch, to taste. The water loudly trickling from the fountains surrounding them drown out his heavy, uncontrolled breaths. 

Zuko sits cross-legged on an enormous maroon bed. The sheets are a fine silk, but he cannot help but wonder what has stained them. There are no windows, and the only source of light in the chambers are a series of candles placed at random. He wishes there were no lights at all, so he could pretend to be blind, so he avoid the pair piercing green eyes belonging to the woman in front of him. Zuko has never seen green eyes before, especially not on a fire nation woman. 

If his mother was still here, what would she say? If she was still here, would this even be happening?

It didn’t matter. His father was the one who stayed, and this is what he wanted. So Zuko would appease him. 

The woman appears to be in her early twenties. Her hair is long, a chestnut brown, and it cascades down her shoulders, crawls down her back to rest at the bottom of her hips. A skimpy yet elegant red fabric covers her chest and everything in between her legs, with golden cloth sewn into the seams. 

These observations mean nothing to him; all he can think about is how her hair reminds him of his mother, and it makes his stomach turn in disgust. Zuko discreetly swallows his spit, trying to hide his anxiety. He shouldn’t be this nervous, or scared. She was going to fix him—that was a good thing. 

She was going to make him a man. 

* * *

He hopes his uncle doesn’t know what he’s up to, when Jet guides him into one of the few bathrooms aboard the ferry. He hopes that _no one_ does, though he suspects Jet’s two friends do. Zuko thinks he has done this many times before. 

Jet locks the door behind them, immediately backing Zuko against a wall, with that damn smirk styling his face. 

“Ready to go?” Jet asks him, smug and aggravating. Zuko nods, a bit surprised Jet would check with him at all. 

He isn’t quite sure what to expect next, but he knows he wants it. 

Jet latches his mouth onto Zuko’s neck, sucking hard and grazing his teeth against the skin. Zuko groans at the feeling, but he has barely any time to savor it before Jet drops to his knees. There is barely any time for foreplay—whether that is due to circumstances or is just Jet’s style, Zuko isn’t sure, but he seems to be only interested in giving, which Zuko is more than fine with. 

Years of suppressing his feelings, his sexuality in _any_ form, and suddenly he is throwing it away for a boy he doesn’t know. But at least this time, it’s arousing and it’s exciting and its of his own volition. When he gets hard it doesn’t feel alien, like his mind was severed from his body. 

He notices how different Jet’s body is compared to the green-eyed woman’s. Though logically he knew it would be, it was still a significant discovery in Zuko’s mind. Jet’s hands were rough and calloused and he had scars and there was a fire in Jet’s eyes that Zuko could recognize in his reflection. 

Afterwards, there is guilt weighing at him, for having sex with another boy. But it is nothing compared to the sinking feeling he felt after his night with the green-eyed woman. If no one found out, how bad could it be?

Zuko supposes the green-eyed woman was for nothing, because evidently he hasn’t been fixed. He might be okay with that. 

* * *

He hadn’t expected the date to take this turn. Not one bit. 

At the end of the night, Jin turns into a minx. Her eyes are mischievous, like a sly fox now, still maintaining the underbelly of her soft demeanor from earlier. 

“Would you like to go somewhere… more private?” Her fingers creep inside Zuko’s shirt. 

“O-Oh, um,” Is this going where he thinks it’s going? “Sure.”

Jin rides him in an old section of the lower ring, and then they never speak again. It felt nice, but he’s finding that he wants something deeper than just sex. Someone who loves him. 

Zuko arrives back at the apartment; his clothes appropriately dusted down, his blush faded, but the clock doesn’t lie. 

Iroh seems happy he had a nice date, and not suspicious whatsoever. But Zuko knows Iroh is good at keeping secrets, when he wants to. 

“How was your date?”

“It was… nice.”

* * *

Zuko wasn’t sure why he didn’t expect Mai to be a sensual being, just because she lacked passion on the surface. Apparently, most people are sensual beings, he has learned. 

Mai is the first one to suggest it, a few weeks after his return to the Fire Nation. Its the longest he’s gone without having sex after meeing someone he will eventually have sex with, he realizes, and cringes inwardly. 

“Just so you know, this won’t be my first time.” She tells him dully as they are undressing. It is a methodical process at the beginning. He wonders if she is secretly scared of his response under her nonchalant demeanor, or if she truly does not care. 

Zuko is somehow acutely aware of the silence in the background more this time than previous ones. 

“It won’t be mine either.” He replies. She looks at him with what he assumes is her version of inquiry, but she says nothing until after they are done, naked and cuddled up against one another. 

“Who else have you had sex with?” She asks finally. It’s clearly been on her mind. 

“Why are you asking this now? Shouldn’t you have said something earlier?”

“Might’ve ruined the mood. Plus, I didn’t expect you to be so… Decent at sex.”

“Only decent?”

“That’s a big compliment for a teenage boy.”

“Well, thanks then, I guess.”

A pause, before he continues against his better judgment. 

“How many people have _you_ slept with?”

She isn’t affronted like he was scared she might be. 

“This one guy, a couple times when I was 15. He was slightly older.”

“Oh…” Zuko wasn’t sure how to answer. 

“What about you?” 

What version of the truth did he tell her? Once he started talking, how much more would she ask? Would she judge him for being with a man?

“Don’t be mad at me…” He prefaced. 

“I won’t.”

“...Three other people. Not including you.”

She seemed very surprised, at least by her standards. If she noticed the pointed usage of ‘people’ instead of ‘women’, she didn’t comment on it.

“Wow. Prince Zuko has quite the body count.” 

“Ugh, don’t say it like that. It wasn’t like that.” 

“How can it not be like that?”

She never asked for specifics, and never brought it up again. 

* * *

He’s at the Western Air Temple now, and realizes he’s taken his access to both privacy and sex for granted. He’ll get through it. 

He also has to get through a very enlightening conversation around the campfire one night with his new comrades. 

“I’ve missed you two so much.” Hakoda says, Sokka at one arm and Katara at the other. 

“We were so worried about you.” Katara answers, a look of peace on her face, “I was scared that…” She cuts herself off. “I was scared.”

“I know.” Hakoda comfortingly grips her shoulder. 

_Is this what having a normal father is like?_ Zuko wonders. A father who gives you affection personally, rather than through third degree burns and courtesans?

Must be nice. 

“I wish we could’ve rescued Bato and the others too, but at least they’re not dead.” Sokka mentions, shame obvious in his tone. 

“Don’t beat yourself up over it Sokka. You did the best you could. We’ll save it for another time. They’ll survive—they’ve survived far worse. And, if what you’ve told me is true, Bato and Ikiaq haven’t been separated, and those two can do anything together, believe me.”

Hakoda’s comment seemed to lighten Katara and Sokka up even more. 

“Remember Bato and Ikiaq’s ceremony, when Katara interrupted in the middle of it to—“

“Oh Spirits, Sokka, shut up about that!” Katara huffs, blushing from embarrassment. Almost everyone begins laughing. 

“I thought you only had men under your command.” Zuko blurts out, before he can stop himself. The laughing is cut short. 

Hakoda seems a little puzzled. “Yes, I do.”

“Wait, so… Nevermind.” Zuko didn’t want to interrupt their reminiscing with questions that were likely culturally insensitive. 

“No, it’s fine.” Hakoda said sincerely. “Continue. What did you want to say?”

“So… Ikiaq and Bato are both men?”

“Yes.”

“And… they’re together?

“Yes.”

“And that’s… Okay?”

“Well, yes. Do you have a problem with it?”

All eyes were on Zuko now.

“No! No,” he assured them, “Just… Where I come from, there is, is all.”

“How expected from the Fire Nation.” Katara says. Zuko’s been around long enough to know when her venom’s directed at him. 

Hakoda casts a sympathetic look at Zuko—not because of Katara, but because of…

 _He knows_. He could tell just from the slight quiver in his voice and waver in his eyes, couldn’t he? What if this got out—

“Well, it’s not like the Southern Water Tribe is perfect about it either, Katara. It’s much harder for two women than it is for two men, and in the Northern Tribe it’s worse. “

Katara says nothing, and the conversation continues on. 

* * *

“Thanks a lot for interrupting me and Suki, by the way.” Sokka grumbles sarcastically as the two of them punter around the Ember Island beach, taking a break from their training. 

Zuko wants to laugh. Never could he have predicted he would be having a conversation about sex like this casually with a friend. A friend who used to be his enemy. 

“You’re welcome.”

Sokka blows air out his nose audibly. “We still haven’t rescheduled.”

It occurs to Zuko that maybe Sokka hasn’t had anyone else to talk to about this, either. 

“Well, you’ve got a whole house instead of a tent now, so…” Zuko suggests. 

Sokka turns to look at him skeptically. “Are you… giving me _permission_ to have sex in your childhood vacation home?”

“Well. I guess so, yeah.”

“I don’t know if I should thank you or not… Isn’t that kinda weird for you?”

“No, not really. I mean, It’s just a house. I had sex in it once.” He lets the confession fall freely, not quite sure what to do with it during the limbo of heavy silence that falls upon them before Sokka responds. 

“You did _what?_ ” Sokka sounds amused and also incredulous. “ _When_?”

“Um, with my ex-girlfriend. Like, a month ago when we were staying here.” His cheeks are starting to feel hot, but not from the Ember Island sun. 

“ _Nice_!” 

Zuko wants to facepalm. Instead, he digs his shoe into the sand and twists it absent-mindedly. 

“...So how is it?” Sokka queries. 

“How’s what?”

“Y’know. Sex.”

“Um. It’s nice?”

“Oh, come on, man. _Actually_.”

Zuko tries to think of the common denominators amongst all his encounters. When he can’t, he filters it down to consensual. 

“Good.”

“You’re impossible!” Sokka grunts. “I need advice!”

“Alright. Well, do you know where the clitoris is—“

Sokka punches his shoulder, but listens intently anyway. 

* * *

Katara is surfing in only her underclothes, and It’s the first time Zuko ever has the concscious thought that he wants to have sex with someone in advance of the event actually transpiring. 

_I want to have sex with Katara._

Sex is by far the only thing he wants from her. In fact, it isn’t even something he wants _from_ her, more like an event he wishes they could both participate in, if that distinction even made sense to anyone outside his brain. 

He would also like to simply kiss her, and hold her hand, and speak to her. But sex would be lovely as well. 

* * *

How did explaining sex to the twelve year old Avatar fall unto him and Suki, of all people?

“Well, you see, to make babies, a man and a woman will have sex. That’s how women get pregnant.”

Suki is much better at this than Zuko is. 

“But what _is_ sex?” Aang questions. 

Suki looks at Zuko as if to say, ‘ _Your turn.’_

“It’s— Okay, so, you’ve got a penis, right?”

“Um… Yes.” Aang replies apprehensively. 

“And women have vaginas.”

“Right, that’s their version of a penis.”

“Exactly.”

“What does peeing have to do with babies?”

Oh, boy. 

Seeing the look of pain on Zuko’s face, Suki takes over again. 

“Penises aren’t just for peeing. And vaginas aren’t where women pee, but it’s close to it.”

“Huh?”

“Look. A man’s penis goes in a woman’s vagina. That’s what sex is.”

“ _What?_ ”

“Except two men and two women can also have sex and sex isn’t just penis in—“

Zuko puts a hand on Suki’s shoulder. 

“I think that’s good enough for now. Anymore and his brain will explode.” He points in front of them, where disgust and shock have frozen Aang’s face into a statue straight out of a tragedy. 

After Aang leaves, Suki turns to him. 

“How’d I do?” She asks, like it is a performance review. 

“Better than me.”

“Well that’s not saying much,” she laughs, and he laughs with her.

She is a delight to talk to, and Zuko wonders why he doesn’t talk to her more often. 

“How old were you when you got the talk?” Suki asks again. 

How old was he?

How old _was_ he?

He can remember a woman much larger than him, straddling him. Perhaps that was the only version of sex education he ever got. 

“Around Aang’s age.”

* * *

It is strange, how sex permeates the mind during both war and peace. Sex is not always on his mind, but it is a constant. 

Is it a boy thing? A teenager thing? Is it a _him_ thing, or is everyone that way? 

* * *

He can’t believe Katara is under him right now, kissing him, naked and tearing his pants off. 

Everything else had prepared him for this moment. Nothing else had been quite like this. Jet’s passion and pension for adventure is there, Jin’s easy-going and amusing nature is there, the comfort and emotional connection he had with Mai is present as well—everything save the sickness his first encounter left him with. Katara is everything good about sex but reinvented in her own way.

Their first time is perfect, not because it’s mechanically done well, or particularly erotic, but because its theirs. 

Zuko loves sex.

**Author's Note:**

> Tell me what you guys thought of it. I might have another chapter where Zuko and Katara talk about their experiences idk tell me if that's something you guys would be interested in :)
> 
> edit 7/4/2020: thank you all for the reception! I will make another chapter but i'm not sure when yet. I should be updating "out of hand" soon and i am working on a fic about juvie and pregnancy. i should also hopefully get to working on exposure therapy!
> 
> edit 12/24/2020: lol this edit is a lot later lmao basically I wanted to say that instead of another chapter, I've planned out another fic in this universe that will be a similar format but from katara's POV, and then another fic about the both of them. Once again, not sure when i'll get around to this. Thanks!


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